When the wife of Austrian resident Nik Gindelhuber heard he was planning to trade a home they owned more than 7,000 kilometres away in east Detroit for an iPhone 6, she wasn't convinced it was a good idea.
"When she heard she said, 'Are you stupid?'" said Gindelhuber. "In Austria, you know, it would never happen."
He said he bought the house as part of a U.S. government program intended to help those who lost their homes to foreclosures.
Gindelhuber, who has never been to Detroit, thought it would be a good investment as a rental property.
The home ended up not making any money, and he accumulated more than $6,000 in back taxes, something a new owner would have to pay off.
